It is as if we hold, within the inner eye of one’s consciousness, a fading photograph of an innocent, pure child – that child we remember before…

Before what?

Perhaps, the breaking up of a romanticized recollection of an intact home; or a period of natural rebelliousness marking a distancing from the carefree hugs, kisses and unselfconscious holding of hands, when puberty becomes the demarcation point of silly alienation; or maybe just before simply entering into the world of cynicism and loss of innocence.

Afterwards, does it continue to provide a positive impact to carry about the mind’s eye a picture of that child we remember?

After what?

After a lifetime of human encounters reflecting the soil of evil, meanness, indelicate indifference and manipulative motives suspicious of unclean thoughts and insensitive undercurrent of capricious targeting. In those instances, how does one remain pure and reflect the innocence of that child we remember, without becoming destroyed in the process and becoming a mirror image of that which we attempted to resist throughout our lives? For, isn’t that the fight we strive throughout – of trying not to be like the uncaring parents who neglected, the failed relationships we tried and the backstabbing friendships that we discovered too late?

We try and harken back to that child we remember, knowing always that we will never quite ever recapture that moment forever lost, and simultaneously recognizing that it is not an achievable goal, and even something not necessarily desirable to attain. Yet, in the subconscious of our private and compartmentalized souls, we always hold an image of that child we remember, and believe that somewhere in the essence of our very souls, there is that remnant of a spark that has survived the evil detritus of the world around us.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents the Federal employee or U.S. Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of the Federal or Postal job, the realization that the end of a promising career may soon come to fruition will often recall that child we remember, if only because the uncertain future which looms ahead parallels the innocent fear that the child of yesteryear felt with trembling insecurity just before…

Preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is the next step to protect one’s future before proceeding to the next stage of one’s life, and the process of enhancing one’s chances for a successful maneuver through the complex bureaucratic maze at OPM is best accomplished by consulting an experienced attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and to help keep the flame alive of promises kept for that child we remember.

It is all well and good to write the narrative of one’s life, and to live it in accordance with the prose and poetry (or lack thereof) which we embrace; but to write another’s life — it makes one pause, hesitate and move with trepidation. For, we ask ourselves: Of what right do we have? Is that best for the other person? We make such a mess of our own lives; what burden of responsibility must we undertake in order to shoulder the writing of another’s life? But that is precisely what we do when we have children, isn’t it?

Without any direction, few examples (assuming the author is one of the fortunate ones who had good parents in which to mirror a paradigm of reflective and transference of constructive behavior), and certainly no blueprint to follow, we blindly accept the unformed clay of humanity’s beginnings, and assume the responsibility of creating and conforming an unfinished product to determine the future course of one’s community, the greater society, and the historical relevance of an expanding civilization.

Gee, that sounds easy enough. And though we may have made complete messes of our own lives, we somehow believe that we have “rights” and first privileges when it comes to control, command and conforming consolidation concerning creativity confounding colorful conceptual constructs in casting the mold (sorry, but the alliteration didn’t hold for the last couple of words in the sequence).

Then, of course, there comes a time when such narration of another’s upbringing begins to recede, until finally, cessation through maturity, rebelliousness or separation of ways comes to fruition; and the next generation of messes left undone continues in a perpetural progression of regressive deterioration.

Prison workers and correctional officers must feel this way, as they are daily attempting to write the life of others by restraining and reformulating (or trying to) those very failures that were allowed because of priority of rights. But beyond raising children, how many of us possess the opportunity, or responsibility, of writing another’s life, and if we do, how seriously do we undertake that project?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who must file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the writing of another’s life must be undertaken despite that “other” life being one’s own.

In doing so, objectivity must be embraced, and this is often a difficult task, if not an impossible one. For, in formulating a Federal Disability Retirement case, the narration of proving one’s evidence by a preponderance of the evidence must reflect a standard of objectivity on SF 3112A, Applicant’s Statement of Disability, and must not meander into a diatribe of one’s own musings and meaningless messes.

Writing one’s own life is difficult enough; writing another’s life, when that other life is the one which is owned by one’s own life, is beyond being a writer’s hardship, but a necessity nonetheless if the Federal or Postal worker wants to prepare, formulate and file an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through OPM. But, then, we were all great successes as parents, weren’t we?

It is primarily a form of play or sport; but in other contexts, used as a verb, it can imply or denote the manipulation of rules in order to attain a result through unfair or unscrupulous means. As a sport, some engage in the competitive aspects of life itself, outside of the boundaries of organized or even recognized activity — as in playing “mind games” or harassment for purposes of torturing and victimizing.

Fiefdoms tend to encourage that sort of gamesmanship; and while Feudal Lords no longer exist in an official capacity, they continue to pervade through vestiges of barbarity concealed in the cosmetic niceties of polite society.

Perhaps, in some form during the Darwinian lineage of evolutionary survivorship, when brute strength alone resulted in the genetic alterations through environmental forces necessitating unrelenting characteristics in the expansion of the species, the voice of reason was lost, the soul of empathy extinguished, and the fathomless essence of humanity became a whisper of past hopes and bottomless faithlessness in epochs forever forgotten.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, the “game” of harassment, intimidation and unremitting stress piled on in order to test the outer limits of tolerance, is but a daily occurrence no stranger to the fiefdom of yore. Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal positional duties, will need to make a decision in the process of such encounters with coworkers, Supervisors and Managers: to remain in that “game” of no returns, or to exit and move onto other and more fruitful activities.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is a means of moving on with life.

Study history for a few moments, and one can see the barbarism of the past; study it for a considerable pastime, and one can comprehend the loss of hope for the present; study it for a lifetime, and one may see the faint glimmer of light for one’s future. For, as life is not merely a game, but more of an endeavor beyond mere survival, so recognizing that cutting one’s losses before the game’s end is often the smartest move, and that includes preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through OPM, when the time is ripe and necessary, as in the “now” of forever tomorrow.

There are certainly other “languages” for conveying information, including (but not limited to): foreign, other than English (but in this cosmopolitan world, where technology has made such barriers a moot point, it becomes almost provincial to speak of one’s native tongue); body; emotive; forms, including written or oral; other body, such as facial; coded; and others not listed here. The choice of language one uses, is often determined by the context and circumstance mandated for various reasons, not the least of which would be the efficacy of the option taken.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who have, for many years, had to endure the “language” of hostility from one’s Federal agency or U.S. Postal Service, it is perhaps a self-evident point that it is the “written” form of language which must be opted for in preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether one is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset. But it is not the obviousness of the issue which one must accept; rather, it is in the very transition from one’s milieu to filing with another bureaucracy which must be directly recognized and altered.

There is a natural tendency for the mistreated Federal and Postal worker filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, to react to another bureaucracy and administrative process (OPM) in a similar vein as one is used to because of the mistreatment for so many years. But one must mentally transition from the reactive methodology of the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service which one has become accustomed to, and approach the U.S. Office of Personnel Management in a different light.

As such, in preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, one word of caveat: let the foreign language of professionalism prevail, and approach OPM with a singular focus of linguistic content which sets aside all of those wasted years of workplace harassment and hostility one may have experienced in a previous life, and adopt the language of choice — of an effective OPM Disability Retirement application devoid of the garbage of past malice.

The horizon is that demarcation between earth and the heavens; in days of yore, it was the navigational calculus extracted from the curvature of the visible sea in determining distance, time, and the impending cliff over which the ship’s captain would fathom monsters of devouring delights. It is where appearance emerges.

What is shown; what becomes visible to the naked eye; that which is unconcealed and revealed; what the “other” allows for, and manifests, is the horizon of personhood. For some, the superficiality of one’s persona becomes evident quickly and early; others, boredom sets in after a few encounters; for a rare few, the horizon fails to unfold despite a lifetime of inquisitive hunting.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are considering filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the question often entangles the time to judge the other’s horizon, when to emerge from the curvature of anonymity; and the timing of dissemination of information to the agency or the U.S.Postal Service.

In Naval warfare of days gone, it was the ability to view through the powerful monocular from the vantage point of the crow’s nest, which gave the strategic advantage when first sight of the enemy’s position and direction appeared at the horizon.

The revelation of one’s medical condition is likely to already have been a subject of whispered discussions at the workplace; but actually declaring to the Federal agency, its managers and supervisors, of the intent to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, is nevertheless somewhat of a “cat-and-mouse” play, where the bifurcating moment of significance is somehow delineated in that very admission of submission.

Preparing and formulating an effective Federal Disability Retirement application under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset takes time and care; the filing of it, a timing to take care. Whether and when to inform the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service; obviously the filing itself will inform them; but as to whether to declare to the horizon of the other before appearing at that dividing line where earth and the heavens meet, is something which should be done with sage advice and a view towards legal implications.

Seven False Myths about OPM Disability Retirement

1) I have to be totally disabled to get Postal or Federal disability retirement.
False: You are eligible for disability retirement so long as you are unable to perform one or more of the essential elements of your job. Thus, it is a much lower standard of disability.

2) My injury or illness has to be job-related.
False: You can get disability even if your condition is not work related. If your medical condition impacts your ability to perform any of the core elements of your job, you are eligible, regardless of how or where your condition occurred.

3) I have to quit my federal job first to get disability.
False: In most cases, you can apply while continuing to work at your present job, to the extent you are able.

4) I can't get disability if I suffer from a mental or nervous condition.
False: If your condition affects your job performance, you can still qualify. Psychiatric conditions are treated no differently from physical conditions.

5) Disability retirement is approved by DOL Workers Comp.
False: It's the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) the federal agency that administers and approves disability for employees at the US Postal Service or other federal agencies.

6) I can wait for OPM disability retirement for many years after separation.
False: You only have one year from the date of separation from service - otherwise, you lose your right forever.

7) If I get disability retirement, I won't be able to apply for Scheduled Award (SA).
False: You can get a Scheduled Award under the rules of OWCP even after you get approved for OPM disability retirement.